Whether you like his music or not, I gotta say that when I heard one of his tracks from start to finish on the radio the other day, coming from the neighbours yard i.e. over the fence - it certainly sounded really "phat".
The point is that there's a pretty skillful production work going on to have a groove like that sound so good under such poor listening conditions - and it did have me groovin' around my yard while it lasted. Nice one!!!!
Peace,
Andy.
How to make Deadmau5 bass line???
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- KVRAF
- 5948 posts since 19 Jun, 2008 from Melbourne, Australia
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- KVRist
- 313 posts since 11 Nov, 2005
What you've gotta realise too, is that Joel has worked in PRO studios, pretty much all of his adult life, so he knows how to mix and master REALLY well.
PC
PC
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- KVRist
- 43 posts since 7 Mar, 2008
Good basslines can be achieved with any synth really.
The real skill is layering your bass sounds and the treatment you give each part. Some people divide their bass sounds into 2 to 3 parts (even more maybe). A simple example would be using 2 different basslines:
Create a nice "top" sounds (lets say roughly from 200khz up). Maybe 2 saws and and 1 sine. Apply some distortion and maybe some bitcrushing, compression and most importantly EQing. Now cut everything below 200 (this of course depends on the sound you created, find your sweet spots).
Now the most important part here is the SUB bass. Open a new synth and just use a straight up Sine (or 2) and cut everything above 200 (again variable). Do some treatment to the sub (EQ, compression bla bla bla, what ever it needs till it sounds good).
The real art now is to make the gel together (still working on that aswell). Compress them together, apply some more EQ and whatnot to make it sound like 1 big humongous sound.
After that it's just basically up to you to make your own sounds and find your own ways to treat them. Do not try to copy existing styles or sounds but try to innovate.
peace
The real skill is layering your bass sounds and the treatment you give each part. Some people divide their bass sounds into 2 to 3 parts (even more maybe). A simple example would be using 2 different basslines:
Create a nice "top" sounds (lets say roughly from 200khz up). Maybe 2 saws and and 1 sine. Apply some distortion and maybe some bitcrushing, compression and most importantly EQing. Now cut everything below 200 (this of course depends on the sound you created, find your sweet spots).
Now the most important part here is the SUB bass. Open a new synth and just use a straight up Sine (or 2) and cut everything above 200 (again variable). Do some treatment to the sub (EQ, compression bla bla bla, what ever it needs till it sounds good).
The real art now is to make the gel together (still working on that aswell). Compress them together, apply some more EQ and whatnot to make it sound like 1 big humongous sound.
After that it's just basically up to you to make your own sounds and find your own ways to treat them. Do not try to copy existing styles or sounds but try to innovate.
peace
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- KVRist
- 31 posts since 8 Apr, 2002 from Toronto
1: get a monome...he has the 256, i have 2 40h's..one day 
2: get free vst plug "molar" which is a vst plugin for monome designed in collaboration and with deadmau5
3: make or steal some awesome bass
4: have fun chopping it to bits
actually you can try molar with the mouse but its not nearly as much fun or use as it is when used with a monome.
2: get free vst plug "molar" which is a vst plugin for monome designed in collaboration and with deadmau5
3: make or steal some awesome bass
4: have fun chopping it to bits
actually you can try molar with the mouse but its not nearly as much fun or use as it is when used with a monome.
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- KVRer
- 1 posts since 6 Jan, 2009
Hi Everyone,
Hope you have had a happy new year, this is my first post on the forum, i joined especially to get involved in this topic. I love deadmau5'5 tunes.
Vanishing Point, Not Exactly, Harder Faster, Arguru, Faxing Berlin, Reward is Cheese, The Reward is More Cheese are tunes!
I feel that what DiM MaK said about layering and cuting and adding an effect or 2 on the higher layer is where it's at. You'll here it a lot when sound production is mentioned from a lot of people.
I thought I would share with you my version on how I would go about making a bassline sound that I would say would be similar to deadmau5.
The 2 or 3 layer bass
First you need 3 Different VST's, or Synths or Samples from different packages. For reason users use the Thor, Subtractor and Malstrom.
I dunno why but using a different synths for a different sound just seems to create an extra edge to the sound. Other people may disagree.
Layer 1 - Sub
Get your first synth create a sub sound.
Cut it Below 40hz and above 300hz
Compress and Eq
Layer 2 - Mid
Ensure that this sound does not interfere with your sub!
Create a bass sound that has low to mid range properties that do not interfere with you sub.
Cut it below 250hz and ensure you cut it again around 1.6khz
Add an effect or effects - Remember the idea of the effect is to make the sound more intelligent, quirky, synthetic and 3d! not to make it sound like a gravel dragging over a microphone. There are very powerful effect units out there these day that can make or break your sound, be sure to listen and tweak, not to slap it in a destroy it.
Compress and Eq
Layer 3 - Hi End
Create a plinky sound that will a tink to the note of your bass.
Cut it Below 1K and let it go to the top of the spectrum.
Effect with the same philosophy as before (if it needs it).
Compress and Eq
Once you have these sounds laid down next to each other.
The idea is now to get them to gel together. Tweak the attack for each sound so they come in at different times, we are talking milliseconds here, so it won't even be noticeable to the listener that you have done this.
This is so that the three layers do no come in as a one big hit, with the notes coming in at different points it'll give your bass like an after taste to the initial sound the listener has heard.
I would suggest that the hi end would come in first followed by the mid then sub. So it would come in with a thin plain sound followed by your mid ranged/bass sound and then warmed through with your sub layer.
Tweak the Decay and sustain too. Can create that after taste idea in reverse now and reduce the presence of your you sub then you're your mid up to the top or visa versa. It's all depending on how you sound it turning out so far to be honest with you.
After you have done this you will need to compress & eq the whole sound together. But I would wait until you have your drum track down, so you can see how to tweak the eq to compliment the drum's properties.
Just a couple of effects vst's I would recommend that bass always seems to come out better that when it went in is
The Vintage Wave Warmer - Nuff said really
The Ohmforce Predatohm 1 (not the 2, just for the pure reason that the 1 is a simplified version of the 2), it's a distortion package that that has a sharp-to-phat knob on it. I always found that the further round to phat I turned the knob, better it sounded lol!
This helps
Hope you have had a happy new year, this is my first post on the forum, i joined especially to get involved in this topic. I love deadmau5'5 tunes.
Vanishing Point, Not Exactly, Harder Faster, Arguru, Faxing Berlin, Reward is Cheese, The Reward is More Cheese are tunes!
I feel that what DiM MaK said about layering and cuting and adding an effect or 2 on the higher layer is where it's at. You'll here it a lot when sound production is mentioned from a lot of people.
I thought I would share with you my version on how I would go about making a bassline sound that I would say would be similar to deadmau5.
The 2 or 3 layer bass
First you need 3 Different VST's, or Synths or Samples from different packages. For reason users use the Thor, Subtractor and Malstrom.
I dunno why but using a different synths for a different sound just seems to create an extra edge to the sound. Other people may disagree.
Layer 1 - Sub
Get your first synth create a sub sound.
Cut it Below 40hz and above 300hz
Compress and Eq
Layer 2 - Mid
Ensure that this sound does not interfere with your sub!
Create a bass sound that has low to mid range properties that do not interfere with you sub.
Cut it below 250hz and ensure you cut it again around 1.6khz
Add an effect or effects - Remember the idea of the effect is to make the sound more intelligent, quirky, synthetic and 3d! not to make it sound like a gravel dragging over a microphone. There are very powerful effect units out there these day that can make or break your sound, be sure to listen and tweak, not to slap it in a destroy it.
Compress and Eq
Layer 3 - Hi End
Create a plinky sound that will a tink to the note of your bass.
Cut it Below 1K and let it go to the top of the spectrum.
Effect with the same philosophy as before (if it needs it).
Compress and Eq
Once you have these sounds laid down next to each other.
The idea is now to get them to gel together. Tweak the attack for each sound so they come in at different times, we are talking milliseconds here, so it won't even be noticeable to the listener that you have done this.
This is so that the three layers do no come in as a one big hit, with the notes coming in at different points it'll give your bass like an after taste to the initial sound the listener has heard.
I would suggest that the hi end would come in first followed by the mid then sub. So it would come in with a thin plain sound followed by your mid ranged/bass sound and then warmed through with your sub layer.
Tweak the Decay and sustain too. Can create that after taste idea in reverse now and reduce the presence of your you sub then you're your mid up to the top or visa versa. It's all depending on how you sound it turning out so far to be honest with you.
After you have done this you will need to compress & eq the whole sound together. But I would wait until you have your drum track down, so you can see how to tweak the eq to compliment the drum's properties.
Just a couple of effects vst's I would recommend that bass always seems to come out better that when it went in is
The Vintage Wave Warmer - Nuff said really
The Ohmforce Predatohm 1 (not the 2, just for the pure reason that the 1 is a simplified version of the 2), it's a distortion package that that has a sharp-to-phat knob on it. I always found that the further round to phat I turned the knob, better it sounded lol!
This helps
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- KVRAF
- 1682 posts since 13 Oct, 2003 from Oulu, Finland
I hope that you guys did notice that the sub bass comes from the kick and not the bass line itself? The synth isn't very bass heavy at all. There's no layering going on at all with the bass synth.
Misspellers of the world, unit!
https://soundcloud.com/aflecht
https://soundcloud.com/aflecht
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- KVRer
- 3 posts since 27 Oct, 2007
AUTO-ADMIN: Non-MP3, WAV, OGG, SoundCloud, YouTube, Vimeo, Twitter and Facebook links in this post have been protected automatically. Once the member reaches 5 posts the links will function as normal.
Its all about layering your melodies/basslines (which essentially is all it is), throw in some filtering and you are set.2 quick examples ive done.
http://www.speedyshare.com/136473122.html (http://www.speedyshare.com/136473122.html)
http://www.speedyshare.com/157485520.html (http://www.speedyshare.com/157485520.html)
Cheers
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- KVRist
- 313 posts since 11 Nov, 2005
Good work, two great examples, I especially like the 2nd one though Ian. What did you use to get that main pad/pluck sound?
PC :p
PC :p
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- KVRian
- 536 posts since 8 Dec, 2004
is that a bass line?!?!?! its a f**king note repeated. and its one of the simplest sounds. i dont get this thread really.
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- KVRer
- 3 posts since 27 Oct, 2007
I NI Massive to create that sound Paul. 3xOsc running 2 Square-Saws and a Sin-Square to round it out. Then just adding in filters and adjusting cut-offs and releases to give it some energy
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- KVRist
- 48 posts since 29 Jul, 2003 from Germany
I made this bass very quick with the Novation Vstation. The same sound sounds with a Nordrack3 more cleaner and hifi. But i also like it anyway...
arguru_sound1.mp3
arguru_sound1.mp3
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- KVRist
- 46 posts since 11 Jun, 2008 from abcdef
Very nice attempt.daniel-b wrote:I made this bass very quick with the Novation Vstation. The same sound sounds with a Nordrack3 more cleaner and hifi. But i also like it anyway...
arguru_sound1.mp3
abcdef
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- KVRAF
- 5542 posts since 26 Apr, 2007 from Noosphere
IndeedNick Cenik wrote:Very nice attempt.daniel-b wrote:I made this bass very quick with the Novation Vstation. The same sound sounds with a Nordrack3 more cleaner and hifi. But i also like it anyway...
arguru_sound1.mp3
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- KVRer
- 11 posts since 4 Feb, 2009
I think I'm gettin' better. Not the sound I was looking for, but was just messing around a little and came up with my newest tune 'Bottles Chinese Restaurant'
http://www.myspace.com/djondelay
All the tracks on the page are made by me, remember I just started. Go easy, and feedback rocks! Unless you say it sucks, that doesn't help anybody.
http://www.myspace.com/djondelay
All the tracks on the page are made by me, remember I just started. Go easy, and feedback rocks! Unless you say it sucks, that doesn't help anybody.
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- KVRer
- 3 posts since 27 Oct, 2007
It's a good start! Try layering your notation with a couple of octaves to help accentuate the bass notes and to create some variation in your melody. Also, it could be personal preference, but i think that there is too much reverb on your lead..maybe just dry it out a little bit more and it would sound niceAoA wrote:I think I'm gettin' better. Not the sound I was looking for, but was just messing around a little and came up with my newest tune 'Bottles Chinese Restaurant'